Numerous references to Stephen Hawking's book, A Brief History of Time, throughout the show. In a black hole, time is severely dilated (i.e. a day in a black hole may be a year from our frame of reference) and once you have crossed the line between the universe and a black hole, there is no escape. The theory suggests that those in control of the Island have created a sort of black hole-like environment to work on whatever it is they are working on and protect it from outsiders.Pros

* This would explain the notion that time moves differently on the Island than it does in the real world. See also Time on the island (theory). * Naming a character Minkowski (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Minkowski) is an obvious allusion to relativity theory. * Relativistic effects would explain the time dilations observed between the freighter and the island. It would explain why the rocket required an extra 31 minutes and why the helicopter arrived at a different time. Those on the island and those on the freighter would have a different perception of time (as stated) under either special or general relativity. * Time dilation due to general relativity would also explain the requirement for a precise bearing to the freighter - the bearing may be the point of least curvature of spacetime and hence least time dilation. By leaving on a different bearing, one could end up returning to the same point in space due to the curvature - even though from ones perception a straight line was followed (as Desmond did) - or even arrive at a different point in time (past or future). This could also explain the extra numbers required for the bearing. * This may explain Locke's references to a bigger, older Walt -if Ben gave an incorrect heading (the correct one being the 305 bearing to the freighter), leading to Walt arriving back at the island aged due to time dilation or in the past, before the crash. * It would also explain the difficulties of outsiders in reaching the island without careful experimentation into (such as the rockets) the spacetime effects. The Black Rock log may contain a map to reach the island to avoid such problems. * Relativistic time dilation can also only occur for object with mass. Radio signals traveling at the speed of light are not affected - hence the phone remains operational. * The naming of a character Minkowski is a clear pointer to relativistic spacetime. * The show has referenced A Brief History of Time more than once. o Aldo, in "Not in Portland", is highlighting the part of the book that discusses black holes in depth o Ben, in "The Man from Tallahassee", has a copy of the book next to his bed.

* Minkowski Spacetime is the most common frame of reference for spacetime, with three physical dimensions and a single time dimension, and it is used in general relativity. Closed timelike curves (CTCs) existing in Minkowski space explain many of the mysterious features of the island (why it can't be found/seen, etc.). CTCs were linked to the Lost universe through clues from the ARG Find 815. * The Dharma Initiative allegedly want to give the human race a longer lease on life, now that the Valenzetti Equation has shown the mathematical probability of species-exterminating disaster to be far sooner than we would like. They decide to use a rotating black hole to accomplish time travel, in order to change the past so that humanity's future can be brighter. The Island, under this theory, would be the outer shell of a kind of gigantic Faraday chamber or Penning trap[1], only with the ability to cut off the hole gravitationally as well as electromagnetically from its otherwise immediate environment (this is assuming they're going the Farday route, since Michael Faraday attempted to find a unification theory for EM and gravity). That way they could run smaller scale experiments on the the black hole in a more controlled way. o This one's a bit of a stretch, and contradicts expert scientific opinion on the nature of antimatter, but it's a TV show, so: There is a supposed surplus of matter, compared with antimatter, in our universe. But what if there was a dense mass of antimatter, something like an antimatter black hole (a "white hole"?). Would this bend spacetime in the opposite direction as a black hole, i.e., would objects cascade away from it rather than being sucked into it (this is still supposing some kind of unification theory for gravity and EM)? If it appeared at the same coordinates as a piece of regular matter embedded in spacetime, the matter would be annihilated and the density of the white hole lessened, but would other matter be "pushed" away from the site? If so, perhaps Dharma was attempting to use a white hole to affect time, and the "negatively charged exotic matter" is antimatter buried underneath the shell of the Island, which is still a super-Faraday chamber like in the previous theory. Suppose further that, because of the emerging centrality of time loops in the storyline, Dharma actually travels back in time, or sends some probe or something back in time, and becomes responsible for the very existence of our universe by cordoning off a tremendous amount of antimatter underneath the Island, hence making it appear that there is a surplus of matter after the Big Bang, and allowing us all to come into existence (it should be noted how much the activity of the silly, made-up white hole resembles the activity of a big bang). Under this theory, maybe at the Swan Station there was some sort of cataclysmic disaster that made the breakdown of the Faraday chamber come to pass, which would result in the annihilation of the universe, so putting in the numbers was instituted as a patch. Maybe the fail-safe somehow shut down the station and released only a certain amount of antimatter, probably erasing some small portion of our material universe, but ultimately saving the Chamber at large from breaking down completely. (I'm aware that this doesn't quite explain the whole magnetism situation in the hatch. But maybe there'll end up being some way around that.) The main conflict of the show, then, I guess, would be between those who are willing to risk the existence of the universe to save humanity, and those who think the universe is more important and we should stop screwing around with the Island.

Cons

* At the speeds of the rocket or the helicopter special relativity would be insufficient to explain the time dialation - the actual effect would be fractions of a second, not minutes. However, in curved spacetime (general relativity) these times would be possible - general relativity simply requiring a large gravitational field, not necessarily a black hole. * An observer traveling along a curved spacetime would not notice any sudden time dilation or change in perception of space (such as the storm that the helicopter had to pass through to reach the ship), but rather would experience a gradual slowing of time when compared to an external observer's watch. Note that this does not hold for an event horizon, but were the island within an event horizon, light would not be able to escape, and radio communication (such as the satellite phone) would be rendered inoperational. * Would not explain The Monster. * Would not explain The Whispers.

Molon Labe

The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal. Aristotle

The Valenzetti Equation is a mathematical relationship that is used to predict the future (crudely speaking). It is a type of mathematical forecasting. The map mentions an area of the island that has â€œLow Relevance to Valenzetti Researchâ€. So, what is happening on the island and where does this equation come into play.

The DHARMA initiative was an active project with the Hanso Foundation, however it is no longer on the Hanso Foundation website. That is because the DHARMA initiative has completed. It seems that all of the active projects of the Hanso Foundation seem to focus on future betterment of everything. This is because the Hanso Foundation is using the Valenzetti Equation to predict changes in the world. The Valenzetti Equation analysis is the Mathematical Forecasting Initiative on the HF active projects.

In more general terms, the island belongs to the HF. This is why Alvar Hanso addressed the UN in 1967, so that he could present his ideas to the UN and they could decide on an isolated place in the world where this research could be performed.

The stated goal of the DHARMA initiative according to the map is the Repatriation Accelerated Deterritorialization of Polar Bears with genetic therapy and extreme climate change. In English, this basically means that the goal of the DHARMA initiative was to take polar bears out of their natural environment and see if they could basically de-evolve the polar bear back to its non-cold dependant state. Polar bears evolved from the standard brown bear (their DNA only varies by a small percent along the lines of a hundredth of a percent) due to a change in climate, so gene therapy and climate change would theoretically be able to de-evolve the polar bear back to the state of a brown bear and maybe even into a new state (one that can tolerate high temperatures).

They did this because the Valenzetti Equation predicted that the polar bears would be extinct. The results of the DHARMA initiative show that it is possible to save animals from extinction, or moreover, it is possible to change the environment dependence of an animal.

Whether this was the only goal of the DHARMA initiative is unclear, however, it appears that DHARMA is completely dismantled.

The Hanso Foundation also has the Mental Health Appeal. If you look on the bios of the executive, you will see that the man all the way on the right had cancer of some sort, and after the Hanso Foundation cured him, he was offered a job with the HF as an executive. Remember how Libby was in the mental institution? The HF cured her with this initiative, and then hired her as an executive (The Liddy chick).

The Valenzetti Equation also predicts certain diseases that would happen on the planet. This is where the Worldwide Wellness and Prevention Development Program comes into play. The sickness that Danielle and company encountered was the disease that the VE predicted and that the WWPDP spread on the island. It was done to develop a prevention of the disease when it hits the world.

The HF has a Genomic Advancement Program, which is a program that creates ways for human advancement pre-emptively or even during adulthood. This could be the drug that is being implanted in Claire, or the drug that the people who man the hatch are taking, which is a way of creating a genomic advancement research. The idea being that maybe pushing the button is a way of telling whether the advancement is working. You have two guys down in the hatch for a year and a half who have to push the button every 108 minutes for that long. Maybe the first people down there didnâ€™t last all 540 days, so the drug was changed, and then the next group was sent in and maybe they lasted longer, but not the entire 540 days and so on.

It is possible that eventually, a pair of people lasted 540 days, and so they changed the experiment to see the results of one person: Desmond. The reason Desmond crashed isnâ€™t revealed, but I bet when we do find out, it will be HF related. This program is also used to find cures.

The EM research project that EVERYONE talks about could actually be quite simple. It is relatively unclear what exactly is being researched, but the Valenzetti Equation most likely predicts a change in the magnetic field of the earth, and so the magnet on the island is used to change the true north of the island. I donâ€™t know what effects of this true north shift are being analyzed, but I will get into this later.

Finally, the Life Extension Project has to do with Joop. I donâ€™t think Joop is on the island, but he may be important. I will discuss that later.

To sum up the first part of this theory, the Island is an independent land where the HF has acquired worldwide permission to use for research related to the Valenzetti Equation. There are multiple research teams on the island as of right now and each of them are independent of the other. Remember when the producers asked â€œdid Ethan know Goodwin?â€ They are part of two different research teams. Which means that the plane was separated for a reason.

We shall start with the middle section of the plane. Part of the WWPDP is to show that people live better and fuller lives when they are isolated from complications and have only simplistic issues to deal with. Now, I understand that a plane crash on an island isnâ€™t exactly a â€œsimplisticâ€ issue, but they are living better now. They have things provided to them, simple as they may be (water, food, shelter). They also have a basic collaboration of skilled people, meaning that the skills/personalities are diverse and useful enough to create a good enough general society for the purpose of this research. The reason for this is because the Valenzetti Equation predicts a coming event that is going to cause catastrophe and the ultimate result is going to be a limited number of survivors forced to form a universal community similar to the crash.

(As a better example explanation, if there is a catastrophic natural event to happen on Earth that kills off the majority of people on the planet as well as a great deal of technology, the disorientation of the people who survive would be almost exactly the same as the disorientation of the people in the plane crash. The difference is that the plane crash is just a smaller scale example.)

The ultimate purpose of this portion is to see how well they survive and what would be needed to ultimately recreate society after a high-extinction event.

The tail section was mainly a part of the Genomic Advancement Project. This is most likely to increase the speed of mental development. Remember when we saw Alex? She seemed extremely advanced for a 16 year old girl. A more generalized explanation could be this. Let us say that the VE predicts the a catastrophic to happen 15 years from now. It would be VERY beneficial for the children as of right now to develop mentally at an accelerated rate so that when the end comes, the younger people are more advanced and helpful than they would have been otherwise. Also, they can see the effects of advancing adults as well.

Of course, Claire was an outlier. She was taken for her kid obviously as part of the GAP, which means that there may be some kind of overlapping of research teams.

Assuming Libby is actually the HF executive in charge of the Mental Health Appeal, she is probably intentionally hanging around Hurley to see if the situation on the island is helpful to Hurleyâ€™s mental health (i.e. is it making it better/)

I know my descriptions are kind of sketchy and all over the place, so to give things a bit more order, here is a timeline.

Alvar Hanso addresses the UN to gain permission and access to conduct Valenzetti research on a remote location that the general world powers would keep secret from the rest of the world.

The HF sponsors the DHARMA Initiative to use the island as a result of the prediction by the VE about the extinction of Polar Bears.

The Incident occurs. If we assume the incident was fabricated, this would indicate the beginning of the GAP experiment with genetic enhancers. If the incident was real, it may refers to two separate research teams finding each other. Mainly, the Incident is VERY ambiguous and I think that we probably wont be able to infer what exactly happened and why it was an â€œincidentâ€.

A control tower begins to broadcast the numbers, resulting in Danielleâ€™s boat crashing on the island. The â€œsicknessâ€ is a disease created by the WWPDP as a result of the VE predicting this outbreak in the future. The quarantine words are spray painted in the manned hatches so the people in them are not exposed to the sickness.

The cure for the disease is released on the island in the form of a â€œfieldâ€ such that it remains there. This cure may actually not just cure the disease, but other ailments as well (resulting in the cures of Locke, Rose, and Jin).

Desmondâ€™s boat crashes on the island and he is taken to the hatch by Kelvin to predicate another experiment.

Kelvin â€œdiesâ€.

The plane crashes, initiating more research projects as described above.

Basically, the VE is used by the HF to predict coming disasters. The HF has the approval of the UN to use the island as a generalized research area. The HF also has their approval to use methods that would be considered unlawful to conduct this research (intentionally causing a plane crash, using people as lab rats etc.). The reason is because the VE predicts the end of the world and the HF wants to ensure the continuation of the human race. The numbers are probably a result of the VE or a solution of the VE or something of that sort.

Molon Labe

The worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal. Aristotle